One of the weird realization for me as I learnt English and listened to authors who contributed to these games, is that many remastered their tracks to exclude swear words and obvious mentions of drugs, or was it EA specialists? NFS Underground and Most Wanted games were filled with rap and metal, but still got rated for teens because of that. When I've heard some of these songs in their album versions for the first time and there were actual lines or even paragraphs I've not heard before it was very weird. I applaud whoever did this and still kept these songs bangers as they are, intact, hard hitting whenever you hard them back then or now like I do.
That was probably never talked about, but here it is: someone did a very good job. You'd probably never notice that until you hear the original.
If you happen to not believe me, check the first verse from Dilated People's Who is Who. That's the worst edit of the bunch, although it's one of my favorite tracks in the game. This flow is fucking tight, DPs are Erik B and Rakim for millenials, fight me. Either way, here are these tracks:
Original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndEvdwIPTU4
Choppy NFSU version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om0PvVJjkgY
That didn't occured to me in the early 00s, but you can hear the MC cut being half-word in. I'm puzzled how it got into production if it wasn't a fuck you from the artists leaving a clue about the whole text, kek.
I don't know why I dumped that on you, but now you know there are specially created versions of songs for some old games that wanted to sound all gangsta but still keep themselves teen-friendly. You are welcome.
A lot of explicit music has (or used to have) a "radio version" which silenced or changed the offensive language so they could be used in places and products aimed at a younger audience. That's what this is.
Music isn't the only thing with censored cuts. Have you ever seen old TV versions of mature rated movies? Die Hard, Scarface and many others had swearing redubbed in corny and unfitting ways just so they could be played on the small screen.
It's just another way of "protecting" kids from one thing while completely disregarding other, more screwed up elements still present in the same media.
I know about that, but these are not clean radio-friendly versions that were published on CDs by producers, they are special versions created for these games. That's what irked me. And with DP's track they've been done noticeably choppy by either artists or EA sound designers. That's not something very important, but that exists.
One idiotic country blurs ciggaretes in the scene and grays out the rainbow for some reason. There's probably no limit to censorship shenanigans.
Ahhh, gotcha. I checked the links in OP this time and honestly the NFSU version sounds like many radio edits I heard before so I'm not sure what to tell you. Couldn't find an official radio version to compare but I don't really hear anything strange there.
Is it a ham-fisted way to do it? Sure. Personally I chuck it up to the fact not every label bothers with a less noticeable edit for their songs.
This is what happens, Larry!